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A House to Live With

In 1951, Paul and his wife Ann turned their attention to designing a home that conformed to their modernist aesthetic. Influenced by the work of Marcel Breuer, with whom Ann had trained, the Rand house in Weston, Connecticut remains a beautiful expression of their modernist ideology. In 1953, Esquire magazine declared the Rand house one of the ten best in America. The exterior, dominated by rich fieldstone, stood in stark contrast to the lively and colorful interior that showcased the architectural design alongside the Rands' art collection

Paul Rand was born Peretz Rosenbaum in Brooklyn in 1914 to Orthodox Jewish immigrants. His father owned a small grocery store, for which Rand often painted signage and advertisements. As a young man, Rand studied at Parsons School of Design and Pratt Institute but never finished a degree. He found the courses unstimulating, as many of the era’s arts programs were stuck in very classical methodologies. Independently, Rand studied early 20th century European modernism, which influenced much of his early designs. He drew influence from the Bauhaus, Constructivist, Cubist and de Stijl movements, as well as the art of Paul Klee, Alexander Calder and Joan Miró.